Cristiano Ronaldo, Lionel Messi As Good As Each Other, This Amazing Stat Proves Why

An amazing stat has been released that proves Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi are just as good as each other.

Ronaldo and Messi are widely regarded as the two best soccer players in the world. In fact, some experts stated they are the best to have ever played the game.

Both players have been scoring goals and assisting their teammates at an alarming pace for the last decade now. But while it turns out that Ronaldo has scored more goals for Portugal, Manchester United, and Real Madrid in the last 10 years than Messi has for Argentina and Barcelona, the diminutive forward has actually assisted more efforts than his peer.

In fact, when you add together the amount of goals that each of players have had a hand in over the years, the figures ultimately even out. You can check out the graph [via 101 Great Goals] below.

Since Messi’s debut, him & Ronaldo are level on ‘goals + assists’; Wayne Rooney 4th [Graphic] http://t.co/Qs5qhyy1io pic.twitter.com/4tktnCREFl

— 101 Great Goals (@101greatgoals) October 17, 2014

Of course, these figures aren’t always definitive. Messi fans could easily point to the fact that he has played 48 games fewer than Ronaldo, while supporters of the Portuguese icon could note that the Argentinian has actually been apart of one of the best soccer sides in history, which would have assisted his cause infinitely.

This table was produced to celebrate Lionel Messi’s Barcelona debut, which came on October 16, 2004, against Espanyol. Opta, who compile a comprehensive list of facts and figures that revolve around the beautiful game, then decided to make a table to truly find out who has been the star performer since Messi burst onto the scene.

It was always a pretty safe bet that Ronaldo and Messi would be first and second in the list, but no one could have predicted just how close they would be in the final reckoning, let alone that they would actually be level.

The release of this graph will probably only exacerbate debates over who is actually better out of the two, but isn’t it about time that soccer fans across the world simply sat back in appreciation at the pair’s awe-inspiring efforts? At this point it doesn’t really matter who is the best out of them, we should just be thankful that we live in an era when we get to see them perform on a weekly basis. Because they’re basically geniuses.

[Image via Eluniversal]